I would personally see 10 years as "a long time" in this kind of context (although that may be contextual depending on what your product does, obviously). If you can honestly claim/show good faith, that is usually acknowledged, but my point was rather how it would be seen out of the blue from an organisation that has been silent for 10 years (my personal first thought would be "why the hell have they still got my information?", but I am well aware that I'm not the average).

Genuinely, I don't mean to imply bad faith on your part, only to suggest the reactions it may receive, and how careful you should be with your messaging.

[0]: https://commission.europa.eu/law/law-topic/data-protection/r...

I really wasn't trying to chastize, honestly it was intended as a friendly dollop of advice as someone who's dealt with this kind of thing. But since you have replied, I would say:

> Yes, there is a clearly valid business purpose under GDPR for retaining the email addresses of users who want to learn how to use your app better and opted in.

Relevance is likely to be seen as contextual. Someone wishing to do something a full decade ago is not likely to be seen as sufficient evidence to justify contacting them now in case they still wish to. That's a big chunk of the point about time-limiting data retention - the data gets less relevant and more problematic over time. I get that you're not trying to colour outside the lines here, but from the perspective of your users, and anyone looking at their potential complaints from a regulatory perspective, the window in which they reasonably consented to contact has closed (and probably some time ago).

The regulations are there, ostensibly, to protect consumers. They will be interpreted in that light. I can almost guarantee that if you sent an email to your downloader base 10 years after they last heard from you, being ignored will be the best case, and the worst will be reports to local regulators.

Be aware that under various regulations, you're potentially already at risk of accusation in terms of unwarranted data retention. If you haven't got a good reason to have kept those email addresses, something like the GDPR might not interpret that favourably. While the GDPR doesn't specify actual time limits, they are expected to be proportionate. Financial records are generally 7 years unless otherwise legally required, so for a decade, you would be saying that these email addresses are more critical/valid than that. That may be the case, I don't know your business, but be careful if you don't want some very awkward questions asked. Just the hassle of having to deal with complaints you might get (and various regulators would take notice of 1 million instances) is likely to be more than it's worth for most.

The suggestion downthread to send a very clear "we still have your address, would you like to opt in to this newsletter, otherwise we'll remove it" is not a bad one, but even then, some people will object to you still having it at all.

Being wrong is not the same as a hallucination. It's a natural step on a journey to being more right. This feels a bit like Andreesen proudly stating he avoids reflection - you can act like that, but the human brain doesn't have to. LLMs have no choice in the matter.

Unless you have some body which is a) serious about enforcement, b) sufficiently toothful to make a dent and c) not undermined by wider geopolitical posturing or economic neutering, you can have all of the regulation you might want and still end up in the same place. I'm not arguing that we shouldn't try and control this, but that we have some extremely large genies to stuff back into bottles along the way.

You could frame those visitors to the Taj Mahal as victims, but that takes quite a narrow and short-term view of value to them. Would the Taj Mahal be as pleasant a place to visit if it were in an even more unequal and precarious society than it is? We all pay for things that don't directly benefit us through taxation (usually). The childless pay for schools, the car-less pay for roads, but we benefit from the society that having them creates. It seems hard to say that those visitors to the Taj Mahal would not benefit from being in a more prosperous and sustainable society.

Broadly speaking though, I agree. What they did was criminal damage, undoubtedly, I have no problem arresting and prosecuting people for that. But I don't believe that it's terrorism, nor that it would have been so unpopular had it not been bloody embarrassing for the armed forces. Honestly, bolt cutters and some paint should not be grounding some of your air defence.

> There are always technical bugs during the early phases of new technology, especially AI, and those issues are typically addressed quickly.

But this is precisely the point - they haven't been addressed quickly, they've been excused and generally ignored/used to troll. I believe they've now been moved behind a paywall, which is certainly one way to communicate how you feel about CSAM material.

> Let’s be clear: this is not about technical compliance. This is a political war against @elonmusk and free speech—nothing more.

Hardly - X has acted without any real consequence here for ages, despite turning into an absolute cesspit. MPs, Ministers, government departments - many are still using it despite everything. That aside, that a different country has slightly different views on free speech than (part of) your own country is not, in any way, a crime. Most nations have some speech which is restricted, at least in some circumstances, the US is no exception to this.

Now, onto the "inspiration"...

> The UK jails people for calling rapists "pigs."

Does it? Show me. Show me the case where that has happened. Our legal rulings are public.

> ...various other unhinged lunacy until...

> Starmer is just punishing a platform that won't bend the knee.

Do these people have the concept of irony surgically extracted? Everything Trump does is generally about punishing people that won't bend the knee/pay him/hand over a chunk of their Kingdom. "Country actually enforces own law" shouldn't really be a headline, but I guess for these people it is now...

Secondly, this is not the blanket labelling of a place as "off-limits" - it's off-limits to a specific group of people who have prior examples of harassing people in that location. It's no different in concept to a restraining order. A restraining order does not make the relevant locations unavailable to everyone, only those to whom the order applies, and the bar for one being granted is not, generally, negligible.

There are genuinely concerning cases where the right to protest has been curtailed (or is trying to be) in the UK at the moment. Some of the laws proposed around restriction of protest are illiberal and overreaching. This is not one of those instances though.

Being there was forbidden for a specific group of people because they had a track record of harassing behaviour, much like a restraining order will likely be granted if someone has a track record of abusive behaviour towards another person. The praying thing is always mentioned as it makes it sound like some astonishing intervention in personal religion, while in reality, it's a complete red herring designed to rile people of a pre-existing viewpoint.

If you're standing by an abortion clinic, and you're a prominent anti-abortion campaigner, who has been known to harass people in the past, it was considered that your presence there is, in and of itself, intimidating to people who wish to access a legal service without undue interference. The ruling is not intended to prevent any of the things you mention, there are still plenty of ways that organisations can make those things generally known if they wish to, just not a particular group of people directly outside a clinic where they have a history of illegal behaviour.

In terms of misgendering Linehan, singular they has been around since the 14th century at the latest, and many style guides are more than happy with the usage for an individual where either gender is unknown, or where gender is considered irrelevant to the case in point. In this case, I would say the latter applies, but I am happy to acknowledge that Linehan identifies as "he" - significantly happier than he is to afford others similar courtesy.